Monday, February 20, 2012

Quite some time ago, a friend of mine gave me a necklace/cord with an attachment for my cell phone. I never used it because my phone didn’t fit onto the “hook” at the end of the cord (I have to admit I’ve been lazy about replacing my phone – I assume it’s simply too outdated to fit the latest hook). So, the necklace/cord sat in my drawer taking up space since I inherited an important quality from my parents: “You never know what’s going to happen in this world, so save everything even if it takes up too much space.”

Finally, I had an inspiration: “Why, not put your keys on it and wear them around your neck instead of having them float in your pocket or belt pack and possibly fall out?.” I have to explain that I haven’t been using my purse lately when I walk around the ‘hood which is why I either put stuff in my pockets or use my belt pack. I figured it would be a lot more secure to wear my keys around my neck.

Last Saturday I went for one of my walks around the ‘hood – it was sunny for the first time in weeks. “Wow – a blue sky!” It was a great walk, and as I got to my front door I felt very satisfied. But not for long. As I reached for my keys, I found – NOTHING. Not even the necklace/cord.. What a disaster (quelle catastophe)! I couldn’t even get into the building, let alone my apartment. One good thing is that I had remembered to bring my cell phone with me. So I took a chance and called the gardien or building supervisor to whom I had given a set of keys to my apartment when I moved in. However, it was a chance, because he doesn’t work on Saturday afternoons – would he even pick up the phone? To my great relief – he did. And was willing to come to the office and give me my keys. And once I was in my apartment, I found my duplicate set of keys, so all was well. Well, not quite. It really bugged me how I could have missed the necklace dropping with a set of keys that should have clunked on the sidewalk. What was going on?

At this point, I decided to pray to St Anthony, the patron saint of lost objects. Okay, okay, I’m Jewish. But I don’t think St Anthony really cares about that. He certainly has helped me in the past to find things I had lost or misplaced. Whatever works, right? (Now – that’s a Jewish attitude.) The next day, Sunday, I decided to retrace my steps to see if maybe I could find the keys curled up in their necklace/cord on the sidewalk, or whatever. Of course I didn’t find anything. BUT – just before entering my apartment building, I saw a sign (a real one), printed, that basically said (in French): “I found a set of keys on this street on Saturday”, followed by a cell phone number. Wow – could those be my keys? So I copied the number and phoned, only to fall upon an answering machine with a male voice saying, “Leave a message.” Which I did. And phoned several time more, finally connecting with a real human being.

“I live at 34 rue de Torcy and I’ll be there in 15 minutes. I’ll call you when I get there” “I live there too! I’ll wait for your call.”

It turns out that he and his wife live in my very own building (!) and when I went up to their apartment – there were my keys!

About Me

I moved to Paris in 1991 from Los Angeles, CA. After the honeymoon period, it was a difficult adjustment to make, but I did it! I now train French university students and managers how to communicate internationally. I'd like to share my musings with you: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeanne-feldman/